“Akwabaa brunee!” – pretty much the most common phrase we hear no matter where we go, it means “Welcome White People!”

Unite For Sight Ghana Experience

“Akwabaa brunee!” – pretty much the most common phrase we hear no matter where we go, it means “Welcome White People!”

The way this works is everyday you attend a different location in an area (e.g. Accra) that previously had been advertised for people to come. Our team arrives at churches, community centers, abandoned buildings, etc. to set up shop. One of the workers explains to the crowd (literally hundreds) of people the process of what will happen in their native tongue (usually Twi, but there are hundreds of tribal languages, like today we learned Gha). First the patients get registered and then are testing for visual acuity. We volunteers do the acuity testing which consists of standing about 6 meters away with your eye reader sheet. The patients then go to the doctors, who test, prescribe medicine, and in some cases make referrals for surgery. We handle check out by distributing medication and glasses and record all transaction and patient history.

….and that’s exactly what we do all day every day. It’s such fulfilling work though. A remarkable amount of people’s visual acuity registers as NPL (no light perception) and it’s very clear they have cataracts from just looking at their eye, which we can provide a surgery to COMPLETELY RESTORE their blindness. Which is incredible! All surgeries are subsided by Unite For Sight, so they get cured for free! More…